January 6, Columbia SC

Drove down today from Maryland expecting to pick up our Tiger. When we arrived at 2 PM today, this was the status of the Tiger.

Ready for delivery?

Frankly I was shocked into silence. I expected to see a shiny new Tiger sitting in front of Provan. Instead we were presented with this. When we left on December 23rd we were under the impression that there was very little work left to be done and that they would have no problem at all meeting delivery on January 6. When we arrived today the water tanks were still not installed, some electrical work was still being done under the hood, and much of the cabinetry was not completed. In addition the airbags were not installed and parts were still on order and as of this writing are not on hand. None of the systems had been tested, but at 2 pm we were told they would have it ready by 4pm so that we could camp in it. At this point the credibility for them was very low and I was not going to risk sleeping in an untested camper in 12 degree weather. So once again we are in the County Inn and Suites, and not in our camper.

Provan has a great reputation for customer service but right now I am not feeling the love. Just to give a quick history. The order with deposit was placed in April with a promised delivery date of June. In June Mark said there were some issues with development of the Malayan and some upgrades he wanted to do and could I wait for the delivery until September. I agreed. In September Mark again asked to delay delivery until late November or the first week of December. After some back and forth Mark agreed that he would deliver the truck on December 19, so we booked flights and as I have said above it was not ready for delivery.

I heard a list of reasons that they were not ready, but I also saw a nearly completed Bengal in the shop that is heading west for the winter shows. The two major issues that were cited as the reasons for the delays (cabinetry issues and wrong brackets for the airbags) were know issues when we departed on December 23rd.) So for them to find out that they again had the wrong brackets on January 5 and the fact that the plumbing system was still being installed today, leads me to believe that finishing up our Malayan may not have been the number 1 priority during the 6 work days between our departure and arrival today.

I hope this is an anomaly and does not reflect future service or the quality of the product, but 3 production delays and 2 missed delivery dates are not acceptable and I hope Mark and his team at Provan will make sure that this does not happen again to any customer.